LabGo: Google for Finding Product Testing Labs Across the Country

There are about 1500 testing laboratories for over one lakh products. If we go into the specifics some products require different testing techniques and some don’t even require it. Though testing part isn’t necessary for things like drinking water at schools, safety concerns are important than rules. Talking about the visibility of these labs, 30% of them don’t even have a website. How would a common business owner find a lab to test his product? Without testing these products, they cannot be sold. To solve this problem LabGo came into existence.

The company is being visited by 15,000 unique users every month.

About

Founded by Rahul Gupta in September 2015, the company acts as a search engine for testing labs so that business owners can be at an ease. LabGo works in the B2B segment, it lists labs and users can search by just typing a product. The platform also has advanced filters where the type of test, location etc can be entered, let’s just say a user wants to get a microbiological test or chemical test for water they can easily enter the type of test too.

For now, the platform is available for lab owners to list their labs and business owners to search labs, for free. On the same, Rahul quoted, “Once we get the right traction number, next financial year we planning to introduce paid services for labs, in terms of advertisements, search listing etc. That will be our revenue model.”

Funding and Monetization

Rahul also stated that the company is currently being bootstrapped. The investment they had to through was around Rs 8 lakh, for IT and developing the software. In coming days, the company will also invest another Rs 5-6 lakhs in digital marketing. Also, LabGo is in talks to raise funds and looking for Rs 2-3 crore for developing both geographically and technologically.

Traction

The company is being visited by 15,000 unique users every month. This portal is serving an untapped niche market, which according to Rahul has a a lot of growth. Giving experts the right kind of testing in an easy way would surely help make the product more better.

Rahul claims that the testing and calibration market in India is about Rs 15,000 crore and this portal will further increase the size of the cake. Testing for pharmaceutical products is a must for every batch of medicine or product, for food processing industry it’s required once in a year, when it comes to construction industry- testing is only necessary for the public sector (In India, it depends on the owners will). Interestingly, it is not mandatory for schools and hospitals to get the drinking water tested though some of the high reputed schools and hospitals get their testing process done occasionally.

This platform will not only put the business owners at ease but also help the market by providing these services.

Future Plans and Competition

One year down the line, the company is planning to launch an eCommerce platform for the same. This platform will come into play in the beginning of next year and will offer services like, collecting the product from your factory (place) and get it tested, also they’ll facilitate payment facilities on the website itself.

The company faces no competition in the market, there is no such search engine or an eCommerce platform in this niche across the country.